The Greater Desert
by Shadsie
Summary: A tale of swords, guns, goddesses, spaceships, princesses, presidents, sages, dust, magic and heroes. When Hyrule becomes a vast desert, a young man named Link is awakened to seek out ancient magic and bring balance back to the land. REBOOT OF THE GREAT DESERT.
1. Prologue: The Threads of Time

**THE GREATER DESERT **

**Ideas / Production / General Creation by Shadsie and Sailor_Lilithchan **

**Written out by Shadsie**

* * *

**Disclaimer: **The Legend of Zelda belongs to Nintendo. Related extra-canon sources referenced belong to Akira Himekawa, Valiant Comics, and etc. This is fan work for enjoyment and the sheer exercise of writing, not for profit.

**Notes:** This story is a remake of an earlier novel-length fan fiction, _**The Great Desert.**_ This tale is meant to be an expansion upon the earlier alternate universe work, incorporating such things as the mythologies of games that had barely come out or had not existed at the time the original _Great Desert_ was written. We also plan to expand upon the framework of TGD in general, to flesh out the oddball alternate Hyrule we created in the first place. No knowledge of the first fic will be required to understand this one. For readers of the first, we plan surprises for this reboot.

This story is Alternate Universe. It takes place upon a converged / linear Timeline and involves (in the main body after the prologue) a Hyrule that exists after the invention of firearms and rapid desertification. While there is a "Wild West" aesthetic and gimmick, the story is truly a _Legend of Zelda_ science-fiction western with heavy emphasis on the science-fiction. For those reading for the "western" aspects – don't expect this to be like a typical western film. _The Great/Greater Desert_ world is much more like _Trigun _or _Firefly_.

* * *

**The Greater Desert **

**Prologue: The Threads of Time **

**…..**

They had not set out to become gods.

What was the definition of a "god," anyway? If it was the infinite and transcendent "All," the very Ground of Being, or something that was supposed to have lived outside-of-time-before-time-existed, then the being that had come to call herself Farore definitely did not consider herself divine. She found it impossible to be all-loving, too, or all-hating, or all of anything. Perhaps that was why she had "sisters" in her "divinity," to take up the slack.

The true reason that they held this position was simply that they had been a part of the same project. If "creating a world" was the definition of godhood, then, yes, she and her colleagues really were rightly called "goddesses."

How many thousands of years had it been since they had begun shaping this planet? Farore had lost track. When one had been made subject to a form of biological immortality, the years blurred, decades blinked by and even a century felt like little more than a week. Farore worked hard to keep a handle on human-style time, however – and she was just a bit better at it than Din and Nayru were. She'd had to keep her mind in a "mortal" phase, remembering what she had once been because she worked with mortal creations directly and often. Most of the sapient species she had engineered had a general lifespan encompassing years just shy of a century for those that stayed the healthiest, with a few wizened centenarians here and there.

She and her compatriots had come from a distant nebula upon a ship that shined like silver, with others in tow. Every one of those magnificent craft had ploughed into the dust of a small world that the three project-heads had worked hard to make viable. Din's seismic reconstructions made an increasingly beautiful world possible. Nayru's working with the chemistry in the soil and the air to fill it with water and watercourses furthered the project. Farore, of course, managed the organic material samples they'd brought from home.

Of course, she couldn't help but tamper with them a bit. The original mission was to terraform reasonably-usable planets to make way for mortal colonists. Somehow, they'd been detained here in this one place for millennia – what with being wrapped up in their "crashland" project, too fascinated to leave.

There was also the fact that the Three had discovered magic to be real. It lived here. There was an energy that resided upon this world that had existed long before they'd arrived and it begged a trio of inquisitive scientists to figure out just what it was made of. This was how the three women had become gods. They'd tried to capture the magic only for it to develop a will of its own. It had used their technology to crystallize itself into a form that those of another world that were blessed and cursed with biological immortality were unable to fully command. Furthermore, that magic had decided to associate itself with them, and they in turn with the things that it valued, all to be found in the hearts of mortals. Thus the "Golden Goddesses" had become entwined with a world that was only meant to be a simple and temporary project.

They had become gods completely by accident.

And Farore knew that the golden magic was laughing at them.

The patter of tiny bare feet took her attention off the golden triangles kept in a suspension field in the center portion of the Abode. She turned her attention away from the "Captured Magic Force."

"Check it out, Aunt Farore! I made another robot! It's working really well this time!"

Farore smiled down at the little girl in the loose white dress who absolutely *refused* to wear shoes. She'd kick them off whenever her mother or father tried to put her in them. A metal, vaguely humanoid figure floated beside her on jets of air. It had a quizzical look in its one open-looking "eye." The other was merely an undressed optical sensor.

"It can carry stuff!" The girl explained, "Like, really, really heavy stuff! I thought it could help out you and Din when you re-'range mountains."

Farore laughed. "We'll have to test it. Remember the rule of experiments – test everything."

"And hold fast to what is good!" the girl chimed, "Or at least to what doesn't explode in your face!"

Farore was genuinely proud of little Hylia. She was actually the granddaughter of another experiment she'd named "Hylia," a male with long, pointed ears and an ability to channel the magical energies she, as a once human not native to this world, could not touch. The original Hylia had been the first being she'd tampered with the coding of to make him responsive and adaptable to this world. He'd been a success and had bred well. Farore mentally huffed when she recalled how Din and Nayru had wanted him sterilized. No… it was Nayru who pressed the sterilization option. Din had wanted him killed in his fetal tank before he developed consciousness. Drastic alterations were against the rules, but Farore had decided that the "rules" didn't matter when life needed to find a way. Since then, she'd created many drastic alterations to help life along on their adopted-and-created world.

And now, they were injecting that man's granddaughter with the elements necessary to give her "godhood." Young Hylia had all of the qualities the Three were looking for in a partner in furthering their ever-evolving project. Nayru had especially high hopes that the child might be able to wield and study the "Captured Force" in ways that were not accessible to them someday. For now, the girl soaked up any knowledge her "aunts" had to share with her and had developed a robotics hobby.

"What are you calling this one?" Farore asked, looking at the floating machine.

"Oh, it doesn't have a name," Hylia answered, "If this one works out, I'll have a whole line of them made to help Miss Nayru harvest the chornolite she's interested in. They'll be 'Lanayru Designation' with numbers - to work in her land."

Ah, yes, there were certain territories within a span of land that the "Golden Three" had claimed as principal workspaces for quite sometime. Din was doing experiments in geothermics and minerals in one area, Nayru was doing all kinds of strange things in another, and Farore, of course, had a running forestry-project. The many peoples that had sprung up as descendants of the sleepers on the ships and Farore's experiments were thriving – and much to the Three's chagrin, beginning to worship them and to associate them with certain terrains.

"Ooh! That's the Triforce!" Hylia chimed, looking up at the crystallized magic that was floating on the suspension-platform.

"Triforce?" Farore asked. "Why do you call it that? It's the captured-force."

"It's in three parts," Hylia said pointing. "It's got magic holding it together in the middle and outside it, but the captured stuff is in three parts and it looks like triangles so it makes sense to call it that, don't you think?"

Farore tousled her hair. "Right you are, kiddo," she agreed. "It's a more poetic name than 'captured force' or 'experimental subatomic suspension.' You're going to help us use it someday, to make the world a better place."

"Really?" Hylia gasped.

"Yes," Farore answered. "We don't exactly understand the Force within it, the 'magic.' Din, Nayru and I don't seem to be able to touch it, but we think you might, since the magic is part of your genetic makeup."

"Cause of Grandpa, right? You made him that way."

"Yep. All we know about the triangles is that the power within them has the potential to do wonderful things. With it, we might even be able to understand Everything, or to create a universe without suffering."

"Wow."

"You're darn right, 'wow.' This power can be yours, just for agreeing to help us."

"And live forever, right?"

"Right. It won't be easy. You'll part with all of your mortal family and friends. When we were made ageless back on our home, we were an experiment. We had to leave everything we knew behind as Time swallowed it up around us. There is a great blessing to being like us, but there is also a great price."

"I know," Hylia said somewhat distantly. "I understand that, but if the Triforce can make all wishes come true, I can bring everyone back if I wanna. I can make the world all-good."

"We can, together."

Farore was taken aback when she saw Hylia stiffen. The girl stared at the suspended Captured Magic like she saw something that Farore couldn't see. She reached out to it, but did not touch it, her hand stopping as if held back by the object itself.

"It's warning me," she whispered. "The top-part is Power…if I crave it too much, I will lose myself…"

"What are you talking about, Hylia," Farore said, crouching down, worry lacing her voice.

"I understand…" Hylia said, still staring ahead. "It's like a soul. There are three main parts to the soul – one part 'head,' one part 'heart' and one part… 'stomach.' One part of this is like a mind…logic, reason… one is emotion, morality…one is impulse, hunger, strength…"

"I see…" Farore said dully.

Hylia turned to her and grinned. "I think I understand it better 'cause I'm closer to still bein' mortal."

* * *

The ages rolled on. Hylia grew up. Just as planned, her aging stopped. She lost her family and her friends, save for her special "three aunts" and quickly lost any sense of sorrow, for years blinked by in days and minutes. Unlike the Three, who retreated to a private and distant existence, Hylia chose to walk through Farore's forests, to take ships maintained by her robots across Nayru's seas and to visit the mines where the mole-people and rock-folk made their nests.

She engaged in her own projects, echoing the pursuits of women who'd raised her. She busied herself creating springs and watercourses in honor of Nayru. She'd also created a temple with a budding library for the mortals because Aunt Nayru had told her all about data-management and information libraries. She refined metals for the creation of temples and developed a system of gem-cutting that people adopted for use in creating currency. She knew that Din would be proud. Her biological experimentation led to the creation of three great dragons, which she named for her aunts and for the lands they resided in. In a land of mortals, these immortal beasts became her dearest friends.

Hylia could never remain too sad; however, for the "Force" within the land ensured that she knew that spirits could live on. They could even come back into mortal forms again. She found herself controlling this for some people whom she felt deserved chances at better lives. It was in this way that Hylia found herself directing the aetheric magic. It was always gently, "do as you will" rather than a forced will.

There was an unfortunate side to the magic she's found. The peoples of the land lived mostly peaceful lives, in harmony with each other and with the world at large mainly because negative aspects of their souls were made manifest in physical forms. The magic that lived on this planet had a strange way of separating out some of the more malicious parts of sentient beings and giving them shape as shadows and literal monsters. Ghosts called "Poes" by the humans in the land were created by their own anger over divisions and hatreds that never seemed to manifest as badly as they could have within themselves. People were far from perfect, with theft, occasional murder and general vices, but the presences of Poes and other monsters told Hylia that the state of the world could be a lot worse if they did not exist. People could conquer their dark sides with swords in her world.

Hylia had read history books from the Abode of the Three once, when she was still young. Worlds that did not have this energy separation could, indeed, be much worse than the world she knew. The magic could never be controlled completely. Perhaps, when the day came that the Triforce would let her touch it - that would change.

Instead, enhancements of mind and magic brought her the gift and the curse of seeing through Time.

Hylia found herself back at the Abode when a vision prompted her not to try to wield the Triforce, but to take it, in its suspension-field, to her own temple in the forest to ask it about Time. She sat before an altar meditating upon it for what may have been moments or may have been years.

She found the visions the "mind" portion of the object gave her to be terrifying and heartbreaking.

"How do I prevent the Evil from rending the land?" was her first question. The answer she received was "You cannot." In her mind, the world before her rifted, the darkness of people's souls forming a power-seeking creature that loved causing pain… The creature, at points, seemed to be Oblivion manifest, having taken on a sort of anti-magic from the "Force" magic Hylia knew so well. After that, Hylia sensed a mortal with a strong heart. The part of the Triforce that corresponded to "emotion and morality" seemed to beat like a living vein when this mortal entered her mind. Courage – that person was filled with a kind of courage more pure than she'd thought possible of a mortal… yet it was the kind of quality that only a creature that knew it was capable of experiencing pain and dying could possess.

As she sat before the Triforce, Hylia decided the mortal's fate. She directed magic toward him, but not all of the vision or his life was under her control. That beautiful soul had a hard life, a life of hardship to temper him into an unbreakable spirit. The Triforce told her that his spirit would live after he died. Hylia begged with all her will that the next life for him would be kinder. It was – a life filled with friends and the freedom of flight, but with a price that she would pay. The Goddess sighed in relief when she knew that "cost." She looked forward to becoming a mortal again, even though she knew it would mean that she would start to forget her days of walking barefoot on the grass through endless days bringing springs into being and bringing life to dragons. The high science would leave her, even if the magic never would.

She found the thought strange that the person the visions showed her to be her future selves would beseech her "Aunt Nayru" most of all.

She saw herself and the boy she'd come to know through many lifetimes. Every life was an adventure for the boy, but some lives were harder than others. The lives seemed to alternate between those that were especially difficult followed by ones that were slightly easier, for a given measure of "easy." The life of the Hero's Spirit was destined to follow blood and darkness – but that boy smiled often in the glimpses Hylia got as she pulled the threads of Time.

"Oh, oh please no…" Hylia gasped upon watching Time fragment into three distinct divergent universes, all hinged upon the Hero's Life that she was tempted to dub "The Hero of Rotten Luck." She'd pulled the thread and saw the fragments and could not weave them back together.

Tears stained the stone by her knees as that one's life swept over her. Hylia hated her mortal self in that life. She felt like she had not done enough, not that she could have. The Hero of Time, as she knew his proper title would come to be, had the kind of "tempering of spirit" that twisted her guts. She wanted to shout at her future incarnation that no amount of "giving Time back" was going to restore the boy's childhood. Whatever form one's body took, once one had been through the battles he'd faced, there was no such thing as a restoration of innocence. In one fragment, she watched one half-mad boy become more than half-mad under a full moon in a world on another plane of existence that the Force-magic had bled into. He'd returned and made the best of his life, fractured and torn.

Another fragment was awash in ocean. The world suffered for the Hero's absence, with the Evil beginning to swell and break over the hearts of the people and their land. Nayru and Din were experimenting… and it went wrong. The survivors progressed and developed inventions of steam and iron.

The fragment of Time from this split that caused Hylia to make up her mind was one that saw her people in decline and the most tragic of her Heroes slain before he could finish his task as a Hero. A child's soul cut free from a man's body.

"I can't!" Hylia shouted to the Triforce before her. She clenched her fists against the stone at the foot of the altar and scraped her knuckles. "I can't let this happen!"

She stood up. "It's what I get for peering through Time," she said, talking to herself, perhaps hoping the magic was listening. "My spirit fragmented, his as well… it just doesn't make sense!"

She reached out for the space surrounding the Triforce and pulled a transparent figure out of it. The young man in green blinked, confused. "Zelda?" he asked. "But you're shining…"

"Yes and no," Hylia answered him. She opened her arms and embraced him, rubbing his back, holding him close. "I am… a Goddess… I guess you could call me the Goddess of Time. You are slated to meet with a terrible fate."

"This is a dream, isn't it?" the young man asked. "Navi told me not to drink that sour milk before sleeping."

"Yes, honey, it's a dream," Hylia soothed. "But this is very important. I need you to remember this sequence to play on your blue ocarina when you wake up." She took his left hand, held it out so that the palm faced up and placed a shining thread of Time into it. She took the flute from his pocket and bound the thread to it. The thread of Time absorbed into his spirit. "When you play the Lullaby and the Song of Time, this will set things right. This will set things right."

The boy shook his head. "I don't understand. Why are you doing this? Not that I should question the logic of dreams because they almost never make sense, but…"

"I want to save you," Hylia sighed. "It is time for you to wake up."

She sent the bewildered ghost back to his era as she touched the Triforce. She knew that she'd just thrown away all the plans her aunts once had for her and her wielding of the Triforce. She didn't care. Hylia decided she had made no finer wish. If she'd given that poor "Hero of Rotten Luck" a better go of it, she was pleased.

She felt within her spirit and saw visions of all the eras of her spirit and the Hero's converging. The threads of Time wound themselves back together. The Hero of Time was not slain by the Evil he faced. He also created a time-loop that ensured merely a delay in Din and Nayru's terraforming mistakes, made under different circumstances. His soul remained un-fragmented. To her sorrow, Hylia saw that his life was still quite tragic, but he was able to keep more of his mind together. He left a strong impression in the realm of spirit that following incarnations would learn from.

Hylia was satisfied that she had saved him – and them – although nothing was perfect. She knew that she could never use the Triforce now, despite being in tune with the world's magic. It had accepted her single wish. As Hylia, she would not be able to ask it another favor after having asked it to alter the flow of Time itself. The Goddess knew, to her grief, that it was not long before she would forget that she had ever touched the object and made a wish.

She would forget the circumstances of her "godhood." Time and the Triforce had shown her that she would become convinced that she had never been a mortal, never had parents or grandparents, or had seen the Golden Three in forms that looked very human.

She would, in time, become convinced that she truly deserved to be worshipped. In time, that one species of bird that her Aunt Farore had created on a whim would become a race of sacred steeds for her. She would preside over wars.

Later, she would become convinced that she never deserved to be worshipped. She was to become a girl that lived on an island in the sky, who loved giant birds and wondered what the Surface world was.

After that, the lifetimes tied to the wheel of mortals would bring her many positions. She'd decided already that she was looking forward to her days as Empress more than her days as Princess and desired the time when she'd become a pirate captain most of all.

Hylia decided upon one very necessary project before she began to forget. She turned her back on the Triforce to get her old robotics and coding equipment together. She knew that the Eternal Hero to come would have need of a powerful weapon. She wanted to give it an interface, a program that would help him. She would imbue it with as much of a spirit drawn from magic as she could.

The Triforce remained upon the altar. One of the bottom triangles glowed just a little bit less. The power to bring Time into her submission had started something even the "Goddess of Time" had not foreseen…


	2. Ch 1: Determination in a Dry Country

**THE GREATER DESERT**

**Chapter 1: Determination in a Dry Country**

_Lightning cleaved a darkened sky - a sky that looked like frothy tar and was as dry as the low desert in early summer. The light illuminated the figure of an enormous man standing upon a high hill. Hints of red in his hair shone in the electric haze. His eyes glowed with amber light to match a smooth gem set into his forehead. He raised a fist upon which a triangle-pattern glowed golden. His laughter rose over the earthshaking thunderclap that chased the lightning._

_The air smelled of ozone and blood. _

_Another figure stood apart from the man on the hill. The young man standing in the middle of it all saw the shadow of a regal woman with long, whipping hair behind him. She raised her hand. There was a golden triangle on it, too. _

_The young man was carrying, to his surprise, a sword. They were archaic weapons… only people "artistically inclined" actually used them anymore. They were seen in ceremonies. The boy saw that there was a shield upon his right arm. He blinked and it disappeared. His uncle's gun was in his hand, his finger curled around the trigger. _

"_Best use it on yourself, boy!" the dark man upon the hill laughed. "Ending the cycle would be doing a mercy to your kind!" _

"_Don't listen to him!" The woman behind him said. "The world must continue!" _

_The young man looked around himself. They were the only three people in this stormy world. _

"_How long must this cycle go on?" the dark man bellowed. "It shall be broken! Even if the world shall be plunged into oblivion, it shall be broken!" _

"_It shall never be broken!" the woman cried. _

_The young man was beginning to wonder if he had a say in this, but kept his silence. _

"_Even if the war is endless? You and I both know that this has gone on long enough!"_

"_It is never enough! The battle shall go on as long as this world exists!" _

"_What happens when it ends?" _

"_I don't know… but anything is better than this!" _

"_I thought so. Well, then, enjoy your crumbling world!" _

* * *

"LINK!"

The young man awoke with a snort. He shot straight up in bed as furious pounding sounded upon his bedroom door.

"LINK! Time for chores! Pull your lazy bones outta bed! Shake a leg or say goodbye to your breakfast!"

"Coming, Uncle Russ!" Link shouted. He yawned deeply and looked out the bedroom window. There was a line of pink on the horizon.

"Not even dawn yet…" the teenager complained. Was his uncle getting everyone in the house up earlier and earlier or was it his imagination? He and his cousin, Malon, used to get the privilege of sleeping in on Dinsday, but that was abolished recently in light of some of the shortages on the farm and the need for extra work.

Wondering in an annoyed way why Uncle didn't just hire some new hands, Link flicked on a light switch, pulled a fresh shirt over his head and hitched up his britches. There was nothing like a trusty pair of well-worn blue jeans, though these were getting a bit too worn in his opinion. Link wondered about his dream as he clopped downstairs in his boots and sat down to his plated breakfast of eggs, bacon and toast with the edges swimming in the grease. He gave the eggs a few liberal dashes of hot pepper sauce and looked up at the ornamental case hanging above the seldom-used fireplace in the common room.

He'd been carrying one of the guns in the case in his dream – in one of several dreams that had been plaguing him recently with a common theme. There was always darkness, an ominous man and some woman he did not know but felt, in the dream, like he'd known forever. There'd been some dreams involving animals, too… wolves, rabbits… a wild boar… They didn't cause him distress until he'd woken up to think about them. Link was pretty good at sleeping through his nightmares.

"Stop starin' at 'em," Uncle Russ said as he sat down across from him at the dining table.

"You know I've grown out of that," Link said with a yawn.

"You ain't goin' back to bed, either, kiddo. Too much to do today."

"Faroreday is… kinda like Dinsday," Link tried. "Sometimes I wonder if work is all you think about, or all I'm ever going to do with my life."

"If ya wanna live here, then yes, it is gonna be all of your life. We're in charge of one of the last patches of green in Hyrule. 'Less we can get the tech runnin', Ordona's gonna get a whole lot busier."

"Then maybe you should train me," Link said, keeping his eye on the case holding two old Hyrule Royal Guard revolvers and a broadsword with ancient runes inscribed along the blood groove of the blade. "If people were to come around to raid us, you could protect us, but… you're the only one. If I took up my father's gun and his sword there… and you taught me to use them like you two did in the Guard…"

"Enough, Link," Russ said. "Ya' know we share with anyone in need and we ain't been the subject of any banditry way out here. The Royal Guard is in my past, and it was in your father's past. I promised t' raise you right – as a man of peace."

"Wouldn't Dad want me to follow in his footsteps?"

"His best wish," Russ sighed, "was t' return to his home here and farm. We were Royal Guards in peacetime, and gettin' a taste of that… he wanted to raise his family here, away from a military life. Guns are too simple iffin you ask me, anyway. Swordplay can be mighty fancy, but a sword can be used by a butcher, too."

"Gonna go get the eggs!" Malon cheerfully chimed from the kitchen, grabbing her basket. "I'll meet you for milking, Link."

"Another day, another rupee," Link yawned. "I've been feeling… just feeling really bored lately, Uncle Russ. I'm not sure why."

"Maybe I need to add more to your chore roster," Russ joked.

Link's eyes got wide. "I don't think I'm ready to be a ferrier yet!" he protested, "I only just started training with Fado…"

"Not that," Russ laughed, clapping his nephew's shoulder. "I actually do have a special job ya' can do for me… it should be in and ready by tomorrow… I need to ride t' the post office in Nabooru to get a part I ordered up for the air-moisture reclaimator. The belts are nearly busted on it and it's gotten rusted. I'd rather not make the ride m'self when I have work to do here on the machines and the house. If you can go in my stead… I think a trip into town is just what you need."

"Yeah… I'll do it," Link said, "Although it's just Nabooru… Not much of an adventure."

"Yer girlfriends 'ill be glad to see ya."

Link cringed. "Don't bring them up."

Russ laughed and clapped the boy on the back. "Get yer hat on and see to the goats."

* * *

Link pushed his hat down onto his head as he stepped outside the farmhouse and breathed deeply of the morning air. The sun had risen and the wild desert birds were chirping and arguing amongst themselves. Link adjusted the hat – a wide-brimmed model that kept the sun out of his eyes. It was unusual in that it was dark green. It matched most of his shirts. Link had an affinity for the color green for reasons he did not know why… perhaps it was because it was becoming such a rare color in the land lately.

He looked out over the Ordona Valley. Homes were scattered among the hills – mostly two-story – with cracked wood and flaking white and gray paint. The slate-blue-trimmed shutters over his own second-story bedroom window looked like the next stiff wind could blow them off. The hills themselves were dry and dotted with yellowed grasses and scrawny little scrub-bushes. Beyond were mountains of lavender and blue – the kind of colors that indicated sparse vegetation, with only sand and clay to cover the underlying rock. The valley, itself, greened as it curved inward, being a place where rain and small streams gathered.

There were farm fields and an orchard, not so much kissed by the sun as oppressed beneath it, but going strong with diligent human care. Closest to Link's home were barns and animal pens. While other families that lived in the valley took care of various trees and planting beds, Link's family was in charge of most of the livestock. The people of Ordona lived as a community. For most, the land was their birthright, something that had been with their families for generations. It was, as Link's uncle had gone on about, one of the last patches of green left in Hyrule – so they did well to nurture it.

As Link walked to the goat pen, he remembered how the green used to extend further out and cover more of the hills when he was a child. The land was still changing. He'd grown up with stories about Hyrule as it used to be from the older members of the village – such as Lady Gwen, who kept the orange orchard. Her family had no stake in the land, but she had become a fixture, having moved the valley about twenty years before Link was born. She'd retired from being a priestess of Nayru at one of the ancient shrines. She claimed that the reason why her orchard grew so well was that she had learned many secrets of science at her old shrine.

Gwen had captivated young Link and Malon – and continued to captivate the children of the valley today – with tales of forests and oceans and other things that did not exist anymore out in Greater Hyrule. She also spoke of magic and fairies – and these tales were much more difficult for Link to believe. In fact, he didn't believe them. He could travel anywhere in Hyrule (through the family barely went anywhere past the Nabooru Town) and see the dry remains of forests. There was a petrified forest Uncle Russ, Malon and he had taken a trip to some years ago that lay outside of Darunia. He only had to go to Nabooru to see the salty, sandy remains of an ocean because the Port of Sand lay there. Evidence for the old ways of the land lay everywhere, but magic was something he saw no evidence for.

As it was, he sometimes felt silly breathing frustrated prayers to Farore as he did sometimes when drought was about to make the crops fail or when he was assisting a pregnant animal in a difficult birth. It was strange, really, Link thought, how he had his own doubts about the Goddesses, yet whenever he met anyone in town who claimed that those that that still believed in them were stupid or hopeless, he'd be on them like a starving wolf. He did no violence beyond the verbal – but no one insulted his family, his friends or his "Granny" Gwen - no one.

He sat down on a stool in the milking barn before a large pail and a large blue goat that Malon was holding by the halter. Her basket rested by the doorway, laden with fat green and brown eggs. Malon's right forearm was streaked with three neat scratches, blood pooling at their edges. As Link warmed up his hands and prepared to milk he looked up at his cousin.

"What happened?" he practically yelped. "You should take care of that!"

"I wiped it off," Malon said. "It stopped bleeding. I'll be okay. One of the hens wasn't ready to give up her child."

"Cuccoos," Link groused. "Why is it that we even started raising them for food, anyway? I mean, whoever though it was a good idea to domesticate the little monsters must have been very brave or very stupid."

"At least she didn't cry out for help," Malon replied, scratching the goat between its joined horns.

"I still have scars from that one time when I was little…" Link grumbled, trying to concentrate on his work. "At least the goats are peaceful-natured."

"It was your own fault for hitting the rooster with a stick," Malon reminded him. "And you're exaggerating. You've surely grown out of your scars by now."

"There's a faint one on my back that I can see in the mirror sometimes when my shirt is off and my pants are down. I can show you to prove it."

"No thanks."

"That rooster made the best chicken dinner ever," Link said with a wicked smile. "Point out the hen that hurt you and we'll have chicken n' dumplings tonight."

"Nah," Malon said. "Let's just get our milk to trade with the neighbors for today. After all, we have to get the horses out to their paddocks and clean the stables."

"Your dad wants me to go into Nabooru tomorrow and get a package for him."

"Is that so? We'll have to make sure Rhia's extra well-rested and fed then."

"Too bad the jeep's out of commission, it would be quicker. Still, it'll be nice to ride with a purpose in mind instead of just wandering the hills. It's been a while since either of us has been in town. I hope Rhiannon won't be too spooked by the people and activity."

"She shouldn't be. She's always been good, brave mare."

Link continued his milking thinking about all he'd need to do to prepare for tomorrow – how much water to bring to keep both his horse and him well, how big a saddlebag to bring and other such things. Rhiannon, unlike most of the other horses in the Ordona Valley would never be sold to a merchant or given to the government for use by the military or the postal stagecoaches because she was Link's personal animal. She was about in the prime of life for horses, having been born when he was about twelve. He was almost eighteen now. He'd raised her – everything from helping her wean off her mother to training. He'd been at a loss for names at first – narrowing it down to either "Epona" or "Rhiannon" after reading some myths about horse-goddesses.

He'd read myths about a line of great heroes and their companions and modes of conveyance, as well. He'd read that some of the great Hylian Heroes had horses that were red with white manes and tails. Rhiannon had a cream-colored body and a red mane and tail. Link had also read that the last known steed of a Hero had been named "Epona." That was all the more reason to be different, to give his horse a name from a lesser known mythology.

"Good girl," Link said, patting the goat on the side and taking his bucket to be strained and chilled inside the house.

They named the horses here, but not the goats, the cows or the cuccoos. Rhiannon could rest easy knowing that just as she would never be sold away from her beloved master, she would never be eaten, either. No one in the valley named what they ate.

* * *

Link packed up to ride in the early glimmer of the dawn. He watched a freetail keese dance in the air, snatching up the insects that only came out in the cool hours. He kept a steady pace riding out of the valley and into the desert beyond. Hills flattened out into a dry plain and he worried about Rhiannon's condition. He was always worried about his horse. They were creatures more delicate than most people inexperienced with them took them for. Rhia was a hardy Hylian Mustang, but thirst was a greater issue for her than even for a human. If Link got a bellyache, he could take an antacid and rest – if Rhia got the same thing, it could kill her.

And, of course, there was the possibility here of her being lamed by a monster. Malevolent creatures had been showing up in the desert of late. They rarely came into the green valley of Ordona, but Link had found a chu-chu slithering around the ranch every once in a while. They could be taken care of with a sturdy stick or shovel, or even a quick stomping with a boot if they were small enough and one felt brave enough to risk getting their caustic slime on one's leg. The families of the valley ate roasted leever whenever they could catch the creatures – a local delicacy despite the animate plants being classed as a "monster" species in the old books. Creatures in the hills had been growing bolder, more numerous and, it would seem, angrier. Old Lady Gwen said that it was a "sign of the times" – an omen that trouble would soon engulf the land. She said that if it got really bad, it might be a signal of the end of Time. Link chided her on the idea of Heroes to which she'd chillingly replied that she didn't know if the ancient Hero's Spirit from the myths she believed in even existed in the land anymore.

"Dried up like the sea," she'd said, "Rusted and vanished into the sand like most of the rail lines. I'm pretty sure that the Hero for our age died some time ago before even knowing his destiny…"

"Dried up and rusted away," Link said, looking out upon the hills and barren mountains. No one really knew what was causing the climate change in Hyrule. Royal scientists were hard at work on it. It was said that desertification happened sometimes, with changing weather patterns, even with human and technological involvement. It was known that the province of Lanayru had gone through cycles of green and wet and desert conditions. That which was cyclical for one region seemed to be affecting every region over the last century with the worst of it occurring over the last decade.

Many people said that the problem was an imbalance in the Triforce. That is, those that still believed in ancient artifacts that granted wishes. Most took the symbol upon their clothing or upon the doors of their houses as a purely symbolic gesture – the idea of Power, Wisdom and Courage in balance. Link believed in all of those things, which is why he wore a Triforce pin in his hat or on a coat sometimes. It was an actual object left behind by aloof gods that he had trouble believing in as much as he did the old Heroic Line or sorcerer-kings who were more than merely mortal tyrants.

Link gasped as he saw a figure crouched by broken rocks before a small rise on the well-worn trail. He immediately rode up to the cloaked person and slid off his mare. He gently placed his hand on the stranger's shoulder and nudged, fearing that he'd just found a corpse. "Are you alright?" he asked.

He jumped back when the "corpse" twitched and lifted its head. The face he saw looked fairly corpse-like in its own right. It was a woman's face more wrinkled than Lady Gwen's. A broad smile appeared in the wrinkles and bright blue eyes slid open. "Why, praise the spirits!" she said, "You've arrived just in time."

"Huh? Just in time? What?" Link asked, bewildered. "Do you need any water?" He asked, "Or any food? You must have walked a long way to get out here to the middle of nowhere. Are you lost?"

Link knew that the elderly sometimes had a habit of wandering – those that were losing their minds as their bodies were decaying with age. He took his canteen off his saddle and offered it out to her. "I also have some beef jerky and some bread and cheese," he said.

The woman took the canteen and gave it a tiny, whispery sip. "You are very kind," she said, handing it back, "Of course that would be the case, since you are you. Generations of blood and warfare against the darkness do certainly scar your soul, but never so much as to make you unkind. You are wise, too, helping an old person."

Now Link was sure that this poor woman was brain-addled. "Come on. There's room on my horse for two. I'll take you home. You're probably from Nabooru, right? It's the closest town to here."

"Naaaaboooru," the woman purred, "A proud warrior… So fun and full of life she was…"

"The town," Link said, "Nabooru is a town."

"Oh, yes, a town!" the woman said, finally seeming to get it. "You do know it was named after a great warrior, don't you, child?"

"Yeah, some… ancient legend about a Gerudo who helped the Hero of Time. It's just a legend, though."

"Ah!" The woman said, holding up a bony hand, "I think you'll find that 'just legends' have more truth to them than you think. When you grow as old as I am, you begin to realize things like that."

"How old are you, pray tell?"

"How rude!" the woman shot back, shifting in her seat. "You are never supposed to ask a woman her age. Didn't your family teach you any manners at all? I lost count at around seven-hundred."

Link laughed. "Come on, Ms.-?"

"Sar-Sarah… Sarah Willow," the woman replied. "And not yet. Sit a spell with me. I would like to play a song for you. Think of it as a gift for bothering to stop to help me, or just for being so handsome."

"Alright," Link said, smiling at her as he sat down, cross-legged before her. The woman pulled a little round cream-colored ceramic flute from her robes.

"An ocarina, right?" Link asked.

"Oh, ho ho! You know what this is. Not too many people do. It seems to be a rare instrument. The royal family once had one made of chronolite. It could control Time. That one was lost long ago."

"Chronolite..?"

"Time-shifting stone," the woman answered. "Now, listen. You'll like this."

The woman played a jaunty little song. Link felt as if he were being taken away. He closed his eyes and when he opened them, he gaped, finding himself surrounded by trees with lush green leaves. Grass and fallen leaf-detritus lay all around him. The cloaked woman kept her head down, but the shock of hair protruding from her cloak had transformed from a dull gray to a bright green.

A large picnic blanket was spread out between them. It was laden with plates of many kinds of foods. There were slimy chunks of roasted leever with charred skins, buttered corn, cheese rolls, a roasted pig's head with an apple in its mouth and a basket of strange, red-shelled creatures that Link had never seen before.

Sarah lifted her head and Link saw the face of a young girl with bright eyes. A white light flittered around her. "Go on, eat!" she encouraged.

"I'm laid out in the sand dying of heat stroke, aren't I?"

Sarah cocked her head. "Well, if you are dying, you might as well make the most of your last dream," she said, "but you're not dying. I am very old woman. We have strange powers. I wanted to give you something nice before the journey ahead."

Link prodded at one of the red animals. He picked it up and snapped off one of its legs. "You eat this?"

"Yep."

He placed the leg into his mouth and chewed. The salty sensation that flowed over his tongue from the juice tasted nice, but the darn thing was just too chewy. He struggled with it, trying to figure it out.

"You have to break open the shell first," Sarah laughed. "Snap it open and then put the meat inside into your mouth. You may want to dip it in butter first. It's really good that way."

Link obeyed. "What is this thing? I've never seen food like this before."

"It's a crab," Sarah answered. "You haven't seen one because they don't grow in the desert. They're from the sea."

"The sea doesn't exist anymore," Link said, snapping crab legs and devouring them with gusto.

"It will again, Hero of Tides."

"What? What did you just call me?"

"The tides of change are coming, and the tides shall return," Sarah said, draping her cloak back over herself.

In an instant, the trees and the picnic were gone. So was the old woman. A gray cloak caught on the branch of a bush fluttered in the wind. Link got up from his seated position, befuddled. He scratched his head and took a generous swig from his canteen before mounting Rhiannon to continue his journey.

"A mirage?" he asked himself as he rode on. He could still taste salt in his mouth.

* * *

The sun was beginning to set as Link rode into Nabooru Town. He knew he'd have to find a hotel unless he wanted to make Rhiannon work all night. First, after heading to the post office to get his uncle's package, he decided he'd head to the local bar.

He strode through the swinging double-doors of the Golden Coyote and immediately cringed when he heard the collective gasp of voices he recognized. Cassie was wearing her usual bright red dress – she was one of the performance-dancers here, but she was sitting at the bar nursing some kind of fruit-based drink. Currently, the Birdcage affixed in the middle of the saloon held a wildly gyrating woman with magenta hair and too much makeup. She seemed to be clothed in only vines and leaves – fake leaves. Link did not recognize her – she must be new. Peatrice sighed at the end of the bar. Maku jumped, clapped her hands and ran up to Link, taking him by the hands.

"Oh, Link! You haven't visited us in forever! You've left us all lonely, you cad! Dance with me!"

Link shook his hands out from hers. "I don't much feel like dancing, Maku," he said, trying to excuse himself. "I'm here on business."

"You're always here on business," Maku pouted. "It must be hard being a farm boy, work, work, work, all the time… no time for a handsome fella like you to go dancin'."

"I need a freaking drink," Link sighed. He sat down on a stool and smiled upon seeing the face of old Telmas.

"Milk or tea, kid?" Telmas boomed. The large man wiped out a glass. He was awfully tan for a man who didn't get out of a darkened, smoky bar much.

"Ambrosia Pale," Link replied – knowing one of the popular local beers, "That or a shot of Goron stone-whiskey."

"Still too young," Telmas groused.

"Aw, Telmas…" Link pleaded, "You don't bother with age restrictions for anyone around here… no one but me."

"That's 'cause nobody's uncle's an ex-Guardsman," Telmas replied. "Yer uncle'd have m' hide tanned and hangin' on his shed if he found out I drunkene'd ya up, 'specially iffin yer doin' a job fer 'im."

"Chateau Romani, then?"

"Nothin' doin'. Ya take me for an idgit? It may be milk, but that stuff'll get ya higher 'n whiskey. Higher 'n a kite!"

"Hey, I had to try," Link said with a Cheshire grin. "How about a coffee… two creams, two sugars."

"Atta boy."

"Life really is unfair, isn't it?" moaned the girl at the end of the bar.

"Aw, Pea… what's the matter?" Link asked, being gentle with the girl, but trying not to seem like he was flirting. Peatrice was one of several young women in this town that seemed starved for male attention and had, to his annoyance, sought it from him whenever he came into town. He only came in every month or two, yet the atmosphere was always the same. Nabooru was a boring desert town where nothing much happened. The most exciting of days was when the train pulled in with trade goods and maybe – maybe – a few passengers coming to tour the edge of the sand sea.

Link, as a "boy from way out in the valley over yonder" who only occasionally graced their settlement served to have enough mystery about him to be more intriguing than other boys. He was quite handsome and strong, and most of all, the girls here seemed to be fascinated by his long ears. Not very many people had the "old Hylian ears" anymore. It was a trait that was dying out – possibly a recessive one, but scientists weren't really sure what was going on. Those that believed in magic claimed it was because the magic was drying up from the land at the same rate the waters were. Hylians of the ancient family lines supposedly had the long ears as a sign of magic in their blood and to enable them to "hear the voices of the goddesses" - the longer the ears, the better.

"Parrow broke up with me," Peatrice sighed. She swirled a stir-stick around in her drink lazily. "Why is it so hard to find a good man in this town? Nabooru is soooo boring. I can't pack up and leave for new horizons because of Daddy's business. I'd like just once to catch the attention of someone strong… handsome… honorable…"

Link cringed a little, knowing where this was going. It wasn't that Peatrice was ugly – a little plain, perhaps, but she was so… fangirlish… for lack of a better term. All of the Nabooru Town girls close to his age were clingy, or otherwise not his type. He took a glance over at the Pit – the Golden Coyote's entertainment area and saw, through the thick tobacco smoke, the woman dancing in the giant bird-cage to the strains of the band. She struck him as a little too old for the work. He shivered when he caught sight of her overly-made-up face. Now that was hog-ugly. The other men in the bar – older guys – all seemed to enjoy it, though. Old Fado in the band was really working his fiddle.

Fado – that was a common name. Link personally knew two men by the name so far – Fado the blacksmith of Ordona and Fado the fiddler. Of course, it wasn't like his own name was that uncommon, either. Link was actually a Link Jr; named for his late father. The two Fados couldn't be any more different – the man on the ranch being a large, imposing figure while the musician was rather small and almost childlike in his build.

"Greta the Great, everybody!" Fado announced as the woman stopped dancing and bowed. The men clapped their hands and hooted. Peatrice rolled her eyes.

Link said his goodbyes and wandered out into the streets. He eyed the dingy little buildings. Despite there only being one watering hole in town, there were two hotels – not that it was easy to tell them apart from all of the other houses and businesses of Nabooru clad in whitewashed adobe walls and red terra cotta tiled roofs. The stable was one of the few wooden buildings around and that wood was cracked and dry, with layers from several applications of paint (all in different colors) flaking off the outer walls. Just as Link was about to un-hitch Rhiannon and lead her to Nabooru Stables and pay for a night's stay, his attention was caught by a scream.

A female scream sounded what seemed a few buildings away. Link left his horse at the bar's watering trough and sprinted through the streets. He skidded to a stop at the head of an alley with a dead-end. He felt a strange itch suddenly rise up in his left hand. There was a girl with short black hair at the end of the alley, cornered by three hefty and armed men.

"H-help me!" The woman cried out.

The man closest to him wheeled around. Link found himself staring down the barrel of a loaded gun.


	3. Ch 2: The Destiny of a Princess

**Notes: **Good news, everyone! Lilith and I finally got into contact again. As it turns out, she has been very busy taking care of an ailing family member. I've had this sitting on my hard drive for over a month, now it can finally be posted.

That said, this story-remake may go very, very slowly, in between Lilith having a life and me needing to re-calibrate my brain to the story. I have been working and have started other projects, both fan fiction and original, so coming back to this will take some wading into again. _ Shadsie

* * *

**THE GREATER DESERT**

**Chapter 2: The Destiny of a Princess **

Light shone in through high, arched windows. The interior of the building was painted in a lemon-sugar warmth that smelled of dust, old paper and worn leather. Young Princess Zelda of the nation of Hyrule found this place to be as holy as any temple. She spent as much time in the castle library as she possibly could. Books had proven to be better friends to her than most people could be. When one was born into a position of power, one could never be sure of true friends (even if one was merely the youngest of four royal children).

The children of statesmen would come and go and the children of soldiers always feared losing their parents' jobs if they ever become close enough to be too honest or to fight over toys. Zelda mostly had just her sisters and her books and, as she grew, characters in fiction and the voices of long-dead scholars and sages became her more-consistent companions.

Even as Hyrule was experimenting with a kind of partial democracy, Zelda still lived a life of constraint. If anything, her young adulthood had become even more frustrating than her childhood had been. Her eldest sister had just come of the correct age to take the kingdom over – things had been run by the Council of Elders and a High Chancellor since their father's murder, with opinions of each of the princesses considered. Zelda had been playing politics to some degree all of her life, though not to the degree that her older sisters participated in the processes of law. Princess Cecelia had gone through the training and ceremonies needed to be crowned Queen, though she preferred the term "Empress." This was going to happen next week. The new Empress would be sharing power with a "people's representative" that had been elected last year in Hyrule's first national election.

Zelda did not trust President Dragmire one bit. She did not know why. His name felt strangely familiar to her… and menacing. It was his eyes that truly unnerved her. Zelda felt that he had very wicked eyes. The few times they had met, it seemed that the man had not been able to keep his eyes off her. It was as if he thought of her as prey. Zelda even wondered if a confrontation between the greedy-eyed man and her trusted night-guardsman was inevitable. She'd been studying some of the ancient Sheikah arts of self-defense, but knew that lightness and agility did not always win against the brute force of brawny beasts.

The young princess knew that the president was of the Gerudo people and told herself to have no fear of one kind of assault as he surely had a harem to satisfy his appetites. What Zelda really feared from those eyes of his was not a look of lust, but a look of murder. Dragmire's face was that of a man who loved war.

The entire palace grounds had been feeling unsafe to her of late. Cecelia had full claim to the throne as per tradition, but also per tradition, she was expected to take opinions from her siblings and the Council. Zelda knew that Cecelia was not one to share her toys. The youngest princess had been closer to Kara and Anya during their upbringing while Cecelia had remained fairly distant. There was an age-gap, but also abuse. Cecelia liked to bully. It didn't matter who – her younger sisters, the children of guards, guards and servants themselves, everyone knew her temper. The more power the Council gave her, the more punishments she seemed to dole out upon more of the staff. Most of the lashes given were doled out by tongue, but Zelda felt sorrow for those that were sent out the castle doors – for finding a new livelihood in the increasingly hard land was difficult and many of the palace workers had served because of long family lines of service.

Her Impa had been a profound loss and Zelda had been powerless to stop it. Her sister had decided that she needed to "grow up" and not have such a personal caretaker.

Cecelia had claimed that she was supposed to be named "Zelda." Zelda was not sure why their parents had not gone with the royal tradition in the naming of the firstborn female. There was a rumor that the High Priest of the Temple of Time had "sensed darkness" in her sister the day of her naming-ceremony three days after she was born and had forbidden her the traditional, sacred name. Their parents had said something else – something about "new traditions for a new land." In the end, they'd caved to tradition, in part, by naming their youngest "Zelda."

Zelda passed by a mirror as she walked down the main hall of the library. The frilly white dress she was in made her look like a doll. She hated it. She'd had to wear it for a television appearance with her sisters – starring the soon to be Empress and the President. Televisual communications were one of the newer technologies Hyrule had developed. Zelda wondered, with horror, if the new medium was set to replace books the same way automobiles were beginning to replace trains in some districts and the gun had replaced the sword. Of these, only guns were widespread as yet. Trains were still the only way to get to some parts of the kingdom besides a hard horse-ride or carriage overland, and broadcast signals only reached so far. New weapons seemed to be the first things to colonize any frontier.

The hair in the mirror-image was black. The majority of Zelda's ancestors had been blondes, with a few redheads here and there. The people called her the Raven-Princess because of her long, straight black hair. From commoners, the nickname was a compliment, from Cecelia, resplendent in her platinum locks, it was always an insult.

Zelda rubbed at the bruise on her arm. Her eldest sister had pinched her hard for figiting. Zelda did remember good times with her – riding horses and playing with the family tea-sets. She wished she could go back to times like those, before either being ignored or shown her place had become the default setting of their relationship.

"Hey, princess!" the librarian called from the reference desk.

"Hello, Lilian!" Zelda replied, smiling. "You don't have to be so formal."

"Ah, sure I do," Lilian mildly protested. "I do have my place, after all, and it would be rude not to address you properly. Are you looking for anything special today?"

"Not really, maybe something on history… on the ancient treaties with neighboring nations and dimensional rift-worlds. Did Termina ever have presidents? I know I haven't been able to find much on that world on my own… and the language barrier…"

"I've got just the thing. I've actually been thinking of the right time to present it to you. I do think you're ready. You've already decoded Great Sea-Era Hylian, but this…. This is very special."

Lilian ducked behind the counter and with a huff and a grunt, she slammed a thick tome upon the top of the desk in a flurry of dust. Zelda coughed and choked. The pages of the book were not so much yellowed as brown, even slightly charred in places. The cover of the book was ornate – green leather with a beautiful Triforce and framing in worn gold. Zelda noticed that Lilian had donned her white gloves when she ever so carefully opened the cover.

"This is the Book of Mudora," the librarian said with a broad smile. "The oldest existing copy, too. It's been added to in recent years, with notes stuck into it and it always had blank pages – designed for scholars to keep adding to it as they uncovered our history."

Zelda's eyes were wide. "Isn't this… isn't it a holy book? Shouldn't it be in the Temple of Time under the care of the priests?"

Lilian laughed softly. "Oh, everyone thinks that these days! No, no… those of us who've been given permission to study it know that it is simply a translation-convention. It's a code of all of the written languages that have ever been used within Hyrule – and some of the languages of neighboring kingdoms that have come and gone. Let me show you…"

Lilian carefully turned to a page in the book's center. "Right here is a language called the 'Sky Writing' – next to it is a translation into Twilight War-Era Hylian… that was done in that time period by a father and son team. We only know the name of the son, a 'Professor Shad," but, sadly, his father's name was lost to time. She turned another page, toward the back of the book. "And here… is Twilight War-Era Hylian translated into current Hylian. Translations are rough, but you get the idea… this one even has pronunciations sounded out in the margins. This was translated by Sir Horwell, who is still living out his retirement in Saria Town, so I heard. He believed in magic spells and that one might need to know the proper pronunciations to enact them should one find a sealed monument. What one might call a quaint superstition helped in the gathering of knowledge… I doubt he would have been so diligent in his work without the belief."

Zelda was at a loss for words. She just kept staring, pondering the letters – both the strange and the familiar, but especially the strange – carefully.

"Our language has changed much with the centuries, has it not?" Lilian observed. "I rather like Middle Kingdom Hylian, myself. It's quite elegant, especially sung – provided we have the proper pronunciation-convention handed down to us. That was the era that's rumored…"

"The Triforce-Split Era," Zelda interrupted. "The Era of the Hero of Time."

"Well, we do not know if the legends have any truth to them, of course. There is some evidence for the existence of the Hero of Time, but people are always debating it."

"You're letting me use this?"

"I trust you to take great care with it," Lilian said, "You're old enough now. Just between you and me, I haven't let your sisters touch it. I doubt Cecelia even knows it exists. She wouldn't know how to use it, anyway. It is not a book for gaining power; it is a book for gaining knowledge. You may use it with any of the books in the library. You already know where the most ancient books are kept in the back. Who knows? You may discover new forgotten languages. If anyone is able to figure out the one lost one in here, I think it may be you."

"A known lost language?"

Lilian turned a page. "Here. We don't know whether to call it 'Pre-Sky Writing,' or 'Deep Sky Language' or just 'The Language of the Gods.' It's so old and cryptic, not even old Shad could figure it out."

"I can try."

With that, Zelda happily closed the Book of Mudora and took it to the back of the library to study some of the ancient books she'd been dying to read if she's only known how. She knew that this was a special gift, for Lilian was the kind that might just rescue books over people in the event of a library-fire. Anything she'd been keeping from her soon-to-be-Empress had to be extra-special.

Zelda wondered what had clenched Lilian's favor in this. Was it her interest and eager devouring of such geeky titles as "Ferrus' Guide to the Spirit Tracks of New Hyrule?" Had it been her interest in the notoriously error-riddled but still historically valuable "Hyrule Historia?" Was it that she had longed to read "Sir Shad's Account of the Exploits of the Hero of Twilight?" or even more obscure things like knights' journals of the Great Sealing War?

Zelda felt a profound itch in the back of her right hand. She scratched it through her glove as she browsed books. Something titled "The Fairies' Medical Handbook" caught her eye.

* * *

Zelda's dreams kept her awake again in the night. She had been having many nightmares of late. So many of them seemed to be clearer than usual, more narrative. Her dreams usually had a narrative structure, but at some point, something weird would happen – random cats out of nowhere, telepathic steaks… nothing as clear and true and like real life as the dreams she'd been having over the last month or so. She'd typically find herself at some point in the past. There was always a young man there, dressed in green clothing and a dark figure in the shadows with evil eyes.

She awakened drenched in sweat. The young man had been shouting at her – ordering her to run_. "Get out of here! Now!"_ he'd screamed, standing between her and the dark figure, raising a sword. _"He's going to kill you if you don't get out of here now!" _

She'd gotten out of the dream, but she couldn't help but feel like she had to run – in reality – that there was a present danger to her in the waking world. Her heart beat like the steady rattle of a steam-train or like a frightened bird beating itself bloody against the bars of a cage.

Zelda pulled on a pair of pants and a simple tunic and walked out of her bedroom to the garden. She thought that talking to Pipit might help. Pipit was the night-patrol guardsman posted to the garden and to the exterior of her chambers. He was a young guard – only about a year older than she was and had been married last month. His wife was the area's daytime guard. This was a recent schedule switch that Cecelia had made. Zelda suspected it had less to do with staffing issues than it did in keeping a young couple from spending much waking-time off hours with one another and being happy. Maybe she thought too ill of her sister, Zelda supposed, but it did seem that her bad moods coincided with a desire to ruin the moods of others and she'd not had a suitor to her liking in quite a while.

"Hey, Zel," Pipit yawned. He was far less formal to Zelda than her librarian. "What's up?"

Zelda drew her light coat around her and gave Pipit a sad-eyed smile.

"Nightmares again? Come on… let's sit on the row and look at the stars."

This always made Zelda happy. It was difficult for Pipit to sit down in his full armor, but when he did, he relaxed visibly. Hours of being on one's feet was tough. She was the only person Pipit was charged with guarding, so he relished the chance to sit.

The guardsman pointed skyward. "The Goddess Wings are out tonight… nice and clear. They're close, too…" He traced a constellation that looked vaguely like a pair of wings when one connected the stars. A flag flapped on a castle turret nearby. The feathers on the Hylian flag were gleaned from the same symbol people saw in the constellation.

"I read a book today about the mythical birds the feathers on the flag are based on," Zelda said. "There were the most gorgeous illustrations. One of the birds was bright red, traced in gold. I hope I did not damage the illuminated manuscript. Works that old and that beautiful are very rare."

"I used to have dreams of riding on one of those birds," Pipit said. "At least I did when I was a kid. They were always so clear, too… almost like visions of a past life."

"I sometimes have dreams about the Hylian Patron Goddess," Zelda sighed. "They're nice dreams, but just dreams."

"The priests say she's the only Goddess who ever died," Pipit mused.

"I think she might have existed," Zelda said, "long, long ago. There has to be some source for the residual magic we royals still use… even if it's gleaned from the bones of an extinct goddess."

Zelda formed a tiny ball of light in her hands and then dispelled it. "Most of the magic is gone from the land, then again, I don't know if one is wise in believing what the old books have to say about the great and abundant magic of old. Miracles are supposed to be miracles because they are rare by definition, are they not?"

"I suppose so," Pipit said. "Do you want to tell me about your dream?" he asked brightly. "It might help to get it off your chest. You looked scared."

"I still am… a little," Zelda confessed with a tiny shiver. "I had a companion in the dream… a young man…"

"Is the little princess in love?" Pipit teased. "The love had better be worthy of you and your royal station."

"Not that!" Zelda laughed. She got serious again, "He told me that I had to flee, to run – that my life was in danger. It felt real. I still… I still feel it. Isn't that silly, Sir Pipit?"

Pipit had gone stiff. His blue eyes were like pinpoints. "Zelda… I…"

"Huh?"

Pipit slumped his shoulders and looked down, refusing to meet her gaze. "I was given orders, Zelda. My superiors… they… I'm sure they come from the top, but I cannot follow these orders."

"What, Pipit?"

She saw tears streak down his cheeks. This was something she'd never seen in her guardsman. It unnerved her greatly.

"My lady," he said, eyes closed tightly, "I was told… 'Within the month. Make it look like an accident, a suicide or a failed attempt to thwart a common criminal. Your life and the lives of your family will be guaranteed as well as your position…"

Zelda's blood ran cold. "Are you saying..?"

Pipit suddenly hugged her tightly. "There is a plan," he said, regaining some of his composure, "There is a plan to make you look like a usurper or insane. I don't know why anyone would want to hurt you, but…"

"You have orders to kill me," Zelda finished for him, separating him and looking him straight in the eyes. "Don't turn away. Look at me, Pipit. I know you wont' do it," she said. "I have trusted you with my life too long to think that you would ever harm me."

To the young man's surprise, Zelda smiled serenely. "I bet you've already come up with an alternate plan."

Pipit wiped his eyes and exchanged them for a huge grin. "Oh, to think you know me so well!" He made a whistle into the air, a sound like some kind of night-hawk. A young woman vaulted over the garden wall – Karane, Zelda's daytime guard.

"Come with us, my princess," she said chipperly, "We're taking you on a little trip to our house to play makeover."

* * *

Zelda sat in a chair in what passed for the living room of a humble Castletown city street-level apartment. Karane was busily clipping off locks of Zelda's hair. Zelda found it to be more like butchery, but kept her silence.

"After this, well, I hope my clothes will fit you. You can have anything in the closet except the uniforms and the wedding dress. Pick something plain, okay?" Karane instructed. "The goal is _not_ to stand out."

Pipit stood by a shaded window, peeking out of the curtains every once in a while to keep watch. "We get you dulled down, looking like one of us peasants," he said, "Then we get you on the train. Nabooru is way out there, your best bet for hiding out until things become advantageous for you."

"What is the meaning of this, exactly?" Zelda asked.

"Saving your life, of course," Pipit said, "Or have you gone dense?"

"No, I mean… I hide out, and then what? Is it just to keep me alive to live out the rest of my days in obscurity, or do you plan to make me the center of a revolution?"

"Well, you are of royal blood," Karane said with another clip, this time taking one of Zelda's precious over-the-ear hair-tails. "And you are the proper Princess Zelda. I suspect that history will unfold before you. You'll know what to do at the right time. I do not think that much good will come to Hyrule under your older sister's rule, I'm afraid."

"It feels like dark times are settling in," Pipit added.

"Power struggles among royals are nothing new to history," Zelda said. "I'd just hoped that my family would have become more civilized after the unfortunate events that had already befallen us."

"The world hasn't been right since your mother vanished and your father was assassinated," Pipit sighed. "This was a wave just waiting to break."

"Thank you… thank you so much for what you are doing for me," Zelda said.

"Maybe you'll find a Hero somewhere out there…" Pipit said, "Like in the old legends."

"I don't know about that, but it does feel like the Forces are off-balance," Zelda replied. "In fact, I've felt that way all my life."

Karane passed a small item into Zelda's hand. "It's my train passport," she said. "One way to anywhere in the kingdom. It's a blank ticket."

She resumed her stylist work.

"I had one, too," Pipit said. "I gave it to my mother and sent her on a train to Ruto Village. I wanted her to stay out of things here just in case things got heavy."

He looked out the window again.

Karane started sniffling and then outright crying. "The passports…we… we got them for our honeymoon… we were going to use our leave-time to go… somewhere nice…together…"

"We thought that this was a better use of them," Pipit explained.

"I will find a way to make this up to you," Zelda promised.

Karane let out a sob. Pipit hugged her close and rubbed her back.

It wasn't until the pair had successfully navigated her off the palace grounds and to the Castletown train station with a suitcase bearing some essentials and a few sets of Karane's clothes that the true gravity of the situation hit Zelda.

As she boarded the train and watched the lighted Castletown Station from a window, she looked at the two of them standing together, smiling and waving her off. It was then that she realized that they were both traitors to the Crown now, and worse, they both knew it. They would surely be executed – if not by formal hanging than by some clandestine means. Pipit and Karane were not only giving up their honeymoon for her – they were giving up their lives and they both were well-aware of this fact.

It took every ounce of the former princess of Hyrule's willpower not to scream. Instead, she slumped in her seat and asked with a choke to be seen to her cabin under Karane's name. She flopped onto the bed in inconsolable sobs.

* * *

Dawn shone through the windows of Zelda's sleeping cabin. She was glad for the privacy of the berth – a fancy affair designed for a single occupant, or given the size of the bed, two. In fact, it was the kind of cabin she would have been put up in as a royal. "Pipit and Karane must have saved up forever for this," she whispered to herself as she lifted herself from her wet pillow. Another stab in the heart…

She saw something very strange outside and couldn't help but watch it. There was a horse running alongside the train. Even stranger, it was an armored horse. A few of the castle guards would dress up their horses, but it was mostly for show, for parades. This horse was riderless and galloping over the civilization-devoid desert. The horse seemed to move faster and faster, as if it were _challenging_ the train! Pieces of armor flew off it as it ran.

Zelda could not believe what she was seeing. Beneath the last of the armor (the helm was the final piece to come off), the horse looked ghostly. It was a white mare of the New Hylian breed and it looked semi-transparent. Zelda could see the distant mountains behind its body. She blinked and shook her head; sure she was still dreaming, groggy from her night of impotent despair. The phantom-horse was gone.

She turned around, her gaze shifting from the window to the center of her room. There was a person inside her cabin. She jumped and fell back into her bed. "Who, wha? What are you doing in my private berth?" she demanded.

The petite woman smiled. "Don't bother calling the staff," she said. "They will not hear you. You're still dreaming, Zelda."

The girl reached out a hand to touch hers. It was transparent, the hand of a ghost.

"Let your rational mind take a rest for a moment," the ghost-girl instructed. "I know you probably do not believe what you see."

"Perceptions of the brain can be very tricky," Zelda replied, "especially in the morning on five-minutes of sleep when I have not have my coffee."

"I am not haunting you, I assure you that."

"Then, what? I mean, I killed two people last night, but they aren't dead yet. They should be haunting me when the time comes. I've never met you."

The ghost cocked her head. "Do I not look like one of your ancestors as seen in pictographs?"

"New Hyrule," Zelda said. "The pioneer of the Transcontinental Railroad. The one who drove the Golden Spike uniting Greater Hyrule with New Hyrule. The Rail Queen. You look just like her portrait as a young girl…"

"I wish that my dear husband could have lived to drive the Golden Spike instead of leaving it to me," the Rail Queen sighed. "He'll be coming at the right time to the one who needs to see him, the legacy of his spirit as I have come to you."

"Okay," Zelda said, "if I'm having a dream about my ancestors, why is it that you have come to me? And why did I see a horse racing the train?"

The Rail Queen giggled. "The spirit-mare was me. A counterpart to the Iron Horse, you see. I always did like my time spent in armor. I am here to give you the courage to embrace your destiny and to remind you that history isn't all as it has been writ."

"What do you mean about my destiny?"

"You are meant to join up with the Hero of this age."

"I thought those were mostly stories."

"True stories," the spirit insisted. "I know… the magic of the world is mostly gone and you can only muster a little. You, a light-mage to your sisters' fire, earth and ice abilities, but you are capable of far greater and the land will regain greater if only you embrace the possibility. The Hero's spirit yet lives in this dry land. You must find him and fight alongside him. I fought with my Hero. It sort of broke a longstanding tradition, but… it needed breaking."

"If I am a player in a legend, I suppose it means we have entered one of the dark ages."

"Correct, but our kind has always overcome them. Yours is the true ancient spirit of us…"

"Us?"

"Think of me as a vision of someone you once were. You will remember more as you become more attuned to Wisdom. You will take the power that is rightfully yours and you will led Hyrule to a greener age."

"Green… in this land?"

"There is still some to be coaxed," the spirit said. "Find the Hero. You will know him by his courage. Also, watch out for rats."

"Rats?" Zelda asked, but the vision of her ancestor had already faded. She combed out her butchered-short hair and decided to wander to the dining car to get herself a stiff coffee.

She would get off in Nabooru Town that afternoon, praying to Nayru that she had enough banknote rupees to get a halfway decent hotel room, only to learn that "halfway decent' anything did not exist in Nabooru.

The former princess spent almost two straight days in the dingy quarters she managed to scavenge up studying the Book of Mudora she'd managed to bring and wondering about the dream she'd had featuring her New Hyrulean ancestor.

New Hyrule had been incorporated into what had been called the Old Kingdom or Greater Hyrule after the ancient ocean waters had receded, but it had its own independent and distinct subculture. Whereas Greater Hyrule had a railroad system, it was developed from New Hyrule's system, which was fundamentally different in that the trains ran upon something called the Spirit Tracks there – an ancient remnant from a forgotten indigenous population. They carried some of the last of the world's magical energies – and perhaps the only energies of such kind that most of the general population still believed in. Greater Hyrule's rails were painfully mundane – built of wooden ties from now-extinct forests and tracks of iron. While New Hyrulean culture was practically obsessed with its trains, the railroads were dying in the main kingdom. There were many places where the resources to run them were too scarce to continue the lines. Some of the wealthier areas had taken to building roads to accommodate the novelty of the horseless carriages. Of course, the oddball jeep (developed originally for Hyrule's military) could be seen careening over the open desert occasionally, though the preferred method of travel through the rough country was by horse or some other large animal.

The people that lived in New Hyrule were all descendants of colonists from the ancient kingdom, and in turn, Greater Hyrule was made up of the descendants of colonists from New Hyrule. In a way, the main kingdom had an older air to it, but the people in it had a younger culture than their "New" neighbors. The New Hyrulean nobles, though they answered to the Crown, had banned automobiles in their province. Greater Hyrule had never seen to press them on the matter since there would likely never be a demand for them given the scared nature of the Spirit Tracks to the area's people. Few people there even rode horses or took conventional carriages anywhere. It was all steel and steam for them.

It was appropriate, Zelda thought, for the spirit of her ancestor – if indeed what she'd experienced had not been the result of her brain going crazy from stress – to meet her on a train. What she had read about that ancient queen had her as a true rail-nut. According to reliable history, she'd even had her own private small luxury train and personal engineer. According to rumored history, he'd become her consort. According to legend (and some would say outright myth) he'd been a gods-chosen Hero who'd saved their land.

Zelda spent some time looking over the edge of the Sand Sea on the day she'd decided to emerge from her hotel room and her studies. Nabooru was a sad little harbor town – a once-harbor town. It was still something of a tourist-destination as some people enjoyed the flat expanse of sand, finding even the remains of the sea romantic. The ex-princess had learned that the "sea" beyond Nabooru was quite dangerous. The flats could be walked upon, for the most part. Very few places had sink-sand, but it was an easy expanse to get lost in and the pools of water that littered it were laden with lethal levels of salt. There was one part of the "sea" that was a decently-sized lake that people could wade in and they'd float right to the top because of the salt-density of the water. Some morbid people said that if you searched the dried-up sea in certain coves, you could find un-buried Zora-bones.

After a walk around town, not entirely sure of where to go next in her adventures in exile, Zelda made her way back to her hotel room. She wandered down an alley to throw away the wrapper of the sandwich she'd gotten from the local tavern upon seeing a trash can there. She did not look behind her and later cursed herself for momentarily forgetting her Sheikah survival-skills training.

"The bounty on you will be rich!" came the booming laughter from a very large man.

There were three men and she was cornered. They each had loaded guns pointed at various points on her body. She could tell that the leader wanted to kneecap her – a non-lethal, but crippling move. One man had his weapon drawn toward her middle – a gut-shot – something with a lethality dependant on the type of ammunition used and the angle of the shot, as well as the competence of emergency medical staff – but definitely painful. The skinniest one had his gun pointed toward her head. It looked like that one didn't want to take any chances.

"Gov'ment wants you dead 'er alive!" said the skinny man. "I'd prefer to take ya' in dead, seein' as princesses ain't my type, but Boss here wants you live an' squirmin'!"

"Come nicely and I won't have to use Precious here," the "Boss" said.

Zelda quickly assessed the situation. She thought that maybe she could duck and run under the legs of "Boss" if she was quick enough, though she didn't relish the thought. If Skinny would only get close enough for her to grab his arm, she could wrench it behind his back and snap it and butt his head into the middle-one of the group. She was wise enough to know that she was actually trapped. These were moves she could pull off if she had a sufficient distraction. She regretted forgetting to bring any "deku-nut" smoke bombs with her. She had not learned the full Sheikah magic from her Impa (which would require her to make a specific sacrifice she had not been ready for), so she could not meld into the shadows. She briefly thought it hilarious how she could strategize possible ways to get away from common street criminals in microseconds, yet could not strategize how to make things right in the halls of power.

She'd run with her tail between her legs with the help of a pair of knights braver than she could ever hope to be.

Zelda did the only thing she could do at the moment. She screamed her head off, hoping that a "helpless girl scream" would distract her assailants enough that she could get an advantage.

Instead, a young man came running into the alley to her aid. Unfortunately, he was unarmed. Also unfortunately, he also looked clueless, even downright stupid.

Hello, distraction!

A single thought echoed in Zelda's head as she used the opportunity given her. Seeing the boy stand his ground with a revolver pointed at his heart made her think of the words the spirit of her ancestor spoke in her dream: "You will know him by his courage."

Time was a blur, but she was pretty sure she saw that young man outright deck "Boss" in the jaw and steal the gun right out of his greasy hand. She, herself, was too busy wrenching Skinny's arm behind his back and kicking the middleman in the stomach to be sure what happened next.

* * *

When the adrenaline began to wane she found herself in the saddle of a horse, clinging to her would-be "hero" as they rode across the desert.

"You can stay at the ranch for a while… if you work. We could use hands. If you're new here, I'm sure you could use work."

His voice swam in her aching head, but it swam pleasantly. Yeah… Middie had clocked her with the butt of his piece, hadn't he? That's why she was having trouble remembering anything that happened after she'd kicked him…

A beast howled in the distance. It sounded deep, like a wolf, but she didn't think there were any wolves around anymore… it must have been a coyote.

"Hold tight there. You took quite a hit. We'll get you rested up. I'm pretty sure we lost the Dummy Brigade back in the Lost Hills. I know that place like the back of my hand. Anyone who doesn't know them is sure to get turned around and come back in Nabooru. I hope those men didn't do anything…unseemly to you."

"Ni..no.." Zelda slurred. "Your back's warm. Did you know that? Nice and warm…"

She snuggled into his shoulder. She didn't even know his name, but in her injured state, he sure felt nice. She felt like she knew him, for some reason, even though she didn't recognize his face. He had a nice green shirt on and a pretty green hat. Green…green…

"My name's Link, by the way. Link D'Ordona. It means "From Ordona." Do you have a name or should I even ask right now?"

Suddenly, sobriety came to Zelda's mind. Her head still hurt, but survival instinct, everything her Impa had taught her and the sacrifices made by Pipit and Karane had come to the fore of her thinking.

"M-Marin," she said quickly. "Marin Koho."

"It's nice to meet you, Marin. That's sort of like my cousin's name. I have a girl-cousin named Malon. She's very nice. She's an expert on horses – also on making omelettes. My uncle's an ex- royal guardsman. He'll have a look at your head. He knows a fair bit of medical stuff. Took care of me a few years ago when I broke my arm, so he knows how to do serious stuff."

"Guardsman…" Zelda kept her voice calm, but almost panicked. She would be recognized!

"He retired from the service years ago, like, back before I was born… eighteen years ago and has been a farmer ever since."

Zelda breathed a sigh of relief. He wouldn't recognize her. If they'd even met, she would have been a toddler.

"Are you alright there, Marin?"

"Yeah," Zelda lied through her throbbing headache.

"We're almost there. It's the patch of green up ahead… if you can lift your head to see it."

The wolf in the hills howled again.


	4. Ch 3: It's a Secret to Everybody

**THE GREATER DESERT**

**Chapter 3: It's a Secret to Everybody **

An irritating wetness bothered her head. Fabric brushed in an obnoxious fashion against torn skin – not deeply torn. Gray edged at her vision from beyond her eyelids. Yeah, her eyes were closed, weren't they? She felt groggy. Her body lay upon something soft. There was a quilted comforter over her body. She felt it weakly with her hands. It was uncomfortably warm.

"Hey, darlin'," said a masculine voice, "Finally wakin' up, are you? Don't be afraid. You're among friends."

Zelda's eyes fluttered open. The light was painful.

"Easy, easy. You took quite a hit to the head. Link said you took a gun-butt from some scuzzball. He brought you to us passed out. Said your name was Marin, right?"

"Link!" Zelda almost shot up in bed. The man at her bedside gently pressed her back down by the shoulder.

"Yeah, mah nephew. He brought you in last night. Said you had a run-in with some bad men. We put you up here in his room. You don't look too badly hurt, but there's always a worry with hits to the head."

Zelda's vision cleared and she saw a man with shaggy blond hair and a short beard sitting on the edge of the bed beside her. He looked to be a strong man, with broad shoulders. He wore a kind, yet sly smile.

"The name's Russ," he continued. "And don't you worry, princess. I know who you are, but will keep your secrets."

"Princess?" Zelda asked, suddenly alarmed. "What? I… No… I'm… I'm Marin!" she choked. "I'm just a traveler…and…and…"

"Don't think you kin fool me, Your Highness," Russ smoothly said. "But like I said, don't worry. I knew you when you were a lot smaller. I'd recognize that button-nose and the taper of those ears anywhere… not to mention the portrait on the two-rupee bill. Hair's a lot longer and yer dressed a lot fancier on it, though. I know that sometimes a princess has gotta get outta the palace, plus I suspect there must be somethin' goin' on for you ta come all the way out to Nabooru."

"Don't tell anyone!" Zelda gasped. "It's a matter of national security!"

"Fair enough. Link doesn't recognize you, that much I can tell."

"Where am I?"

"Ordona."

"The outskirts province?"

"The very same. We're pretty hard to get to, so I doubt that anyone chasin' ya is gonna even bother with us."

"Mr. Russ… you said you knew me?"

"Sort of… but yeah."

"How?"

"Well, a lifetime ago, I used to be in the Royal Guard."

A memory flashed in Zelda's mind – a strong, tall imposing figure (all the guards were imposing and impossibly strong to a little girl). Scruffy, short blond beard, a kind smile. Those light, bright eyes.

"You look different without your uniform," Zelda whispered. "And you got shorter."

Russell D' Ordona laughed.

Zelda heard and felt her stomach growl.

"I suppose you can get up and get some breakfast."

* * *

The next morning, Zelda awoke with the rest of the farm. She assured Russ that she felt okay. He left her in the care of Link and Malon. They would show her some of the chores she could do during her indefinite stay with the family. Russ, for his part, muttered something about an "important anniversary" and rode away from Ordona for the day, off on his own business.

"It's something he does at the start of Fall," Link explained. "It's pretty important for him to do it alone. I think he has a friend, maybe even an ex-lover that he goes to visit or somethin'."

Zelda watched Malon transport hay bales. She brought one from the feed barn out to where some of the horses milled, undid the ties and started flinging flakes into a paddock. When Zelda tried to transport them herself, she could barely lift even one.

"Oh, that alfalfa will get ya," Malon joked, "It's packed tight, a bit heavy. Fado binds it thick. Sometimes, you have to watch out for rocks that get stuck in it. I found a deer antler in one bale, once."

"Come on, Marin, I'll show you how to wrangle cuccoos," Link said, leading her over to the chicken coop.

"People would keep cuccoos where I come from," Zelda confessed. "Aren't they a little dangerous, though? Where I come from, they had licensed handlers. Are we going to go check for eggs?"

"Not exactly," Link said as she entered the wired yard and held it open, careful not to let any birds escape. "We clip their wings to try to keep them from flying, but they still get out sometimes."

Zelda wrinkled her nose at the smell. Bird-manure was everywhere in sloppy little white and brown paint-drips splashed over the coop-houses like some kind of abstract painting. Her borrowed boots (she luckily shared a shoe-size with Malon), pressed a disheveled white feather into the earth.

Soon, Link was running around the entire fenced-in yard chasing a fat white hen. "Come here, you!" he said, "Gotcha!"

He held the hen close and nodded to Zelda to open the pen door for him. They exited and Zelda followed Link to a little shed on the other side of the horse and cattle pens.

"Why are we taking a cuccoo way out here?" she asked. "Are you starting another coop?"

"Not exactly," Link replied. He entered the dusty darkness of the shed, with Zelda close behind him. "Hey, Jaggle!" he called. "Ready for ya."

A burly man in overalls looked up from his work – sharpening a hatchet-blade. There were all kinds of strange devices in this building. There was the stone-wheel grinder that Jaggle had been working with, various kinds of knives hanging along the walls and hooked chains hanging from the ceiling. Zelda didn't like the feel of this place. She recalled seeing a large pole standing outside the shed just before she'd entered. She doubted that it was used to fly flags.

A young boy with blond hair looked up at Zelda and smiled. He wiped down a large block of wood, long ago taken from some ancient tree, that stood on the floor. Zelda had a bad feeling about what was about to happen. Link held the chicken by the legs and body and laid her out so that her head rested upon the block. Jaggle brought the hatchet down with a decisive swing. Immediately, Link released the cuccoo's body, which ran, headless, through the shed until it hit a wall, toppled over and flailed its wings.

"Wait until it stills, Colin," Jaggle instructed the young boy, who was wandering toward the decapitated animal.

"You alright, Marin?" Link asked, dusting his hands off on his jeans.

Zelda was staring at the slain cuccoo, which didn't seem to know it that it had been slain, as well as the head, which still rested on the chopping-block, its clean-chopped neck-feathers stained in bright blood.

"Let me see your hat," she requested.

"Um… okay…," Link complied.

Zelda held the hat before her face and promptly vomited her breakfast into it.

"My best hat!" Link yelped.

Colin brought the dead chicken over to Jaggle, who held it by its feet and let its blood finish draining onto the earthen floor.

"We hafta bring 'em in here to kill 'em if we want chicken dinner," Colin explained to the still shaking Zelda, who held Link's soiled hat in her hands. "If the others see us doin' it, they'll gang up and attack. This way, it's outta sight, outta mind. They don't remember who got taken from 'em."

"Yeah…" Zelda said as she shivered. "Where I come from… I mean… I eat chicken all the time, it's just… I've never seen it done…"

"Come on, Marin," Link said, rubbing her back. "You should rest inside. And I can… uh… wash my hat."

* * *

"It's been a long time," Russell Ordona said as he pulled his gelding up beside a red boulder. He slid off; took his hat off and held it to his heart. "Link, brother, if yer listenin', I think some trouble's a brewin'. Zelda came to us. I've been tryin' to do right by your boy, but I worry that you might have been right. I just don't want his destiny to be yours and Grace's."

The man knelt. Here, in a secluded place in the Lost Hills, lay a pair of secret graves. They were marked by a naturally-occurring rock-formation. These hills were red, like dried blood. The ground here was light tan, almost blinding white in the sun. This particular area of the winding cliffs was difficult to get to, as the Lost Hills had earned their name by getting travelers in them lost. People had been known to wander for weeks at a time. Not-so-secret graves were found by people who knew how to navigate the area in the form of sun-mummified bodies and partial skeletons half-scattered by scavengers.

Russell, however, had buried his brother and his sweet sister-in-law himself. It felt a lifetime ago, and, in fact, was, when he considered how different his life was then to what it was now. He'd never brought Link to see where his parents rested. He'd never told him their full and true story. He'd tried to shield the boy, to give him a peaceful life – away from royal scandals and politics, away from the military and war. He wanted the boy to wield plows, pruning hooks and wool-sheers, not a sword or a gun. Right now, it didn't look like the peaceful life that Russ had wanted to give his nephew was going to be possible. Destiny… that damned Destiny of the Goddesses was chasing him down, the Call delivered by an unwitting raven.

Zelda's black locks… even chopped, he knew them. He closed his eyes and remembered.

* * *

"Are you going to bring the baby here so I can see him, Sir Link?" little Zelda asked, sitting upon Link D' Ordona's partially-armored knee.

"Sure," the big man answered, "Not right away, though. He'll have to grow just a little first. Babies are really tiny and fragile when they're first born, and my wife will be really tired."

"I still don't like that you have to go 'way for so long," Zelda pouted, "And Sir Russell's gonna go, too! And he's gonna take Malon! Who will play with me and tell me stories?"

"You've got your sisters," Russ, who was standing in the hall opposite the seated pair, said.

"Kara and Anya are always busy and Cecelia never shares her toys!"

Link gently pried Zelda off his knee and set her down. "We won't be gone for very long, sweetheart. Besides, I have to thank you."

"Thank me?"

"When Gracie got pregnant, I wasn't sure how I'd handle being a father, but you've given me lots of practice."

Zelda shuffled her feet and blushed. "You got Malon… she's still real little, not like me."

"Yep," Link said with a smile, "You're becoming a big girl."

Russell stepped aside as a figure in white came storming through from one of the other hall entrances. The figure was that of a young girl carrying a sword that was too long for her delicate frame. It should have been too heavy, as well, but she managed to hold it.

"Link!" she cried. "You are late!"

"My Lady Cecelia," Link said, getting up from his seat and doing a little bow with his hand over his heart.

"You are fifteen minutes late for our fencing lesson!"

"Yes, Your Grace, I do apologize… I had to explain a few things to your little sister here and…"

"Enough. I chose you as my instructor, Link. I expect you to be prompt."

"If I may ask… It is proper manners to call me Sir Link. I know that you are a princess, but it is still proper manners to address your guards and your elders by title."

"Come, Link. NOW!"

Sir Russell watched Princess Cecelia exit, followed by his younger brother. Little Zelda remained and looked up at him. Russ was stricken. The little princess was giving him one of her "spooky," looks. Even at her tender age, Zelda was known for having odd observations on others that bordered on a "kind of extrasensory perception," – as was whispered about in the halls.

Russ knelt down. The girl was shaking and crying. She ran to him and gave him the biggest hug she could. The man rubbed her small back. "It's okay… I know your older sister can be rude, but she wasn't yelling at you."

"It's not that," Zelda said, looking up to him with wet eyes. "I just got one of my feelin's…. Once you and Sir Link go away… I'm never gonna see him again."

"Aw, why would you say that, darlin'? We'll be back, and he'll bring his new baby for you to play with."

Zelda emphatically shook her head. "I'm gonna see you again and I'm gonna see the baby, but I won't see Sir Link again."

* * *

Zelda rested on the couch in Mr. Russell's farmhouse. She dabbed her face with a moist cloth. Link apologized for having to leave her there, but there was much work to be done. Malon came in carrying a handle-less basket in both arms that was full of food. There was fruit from the orchard, a small sack, presumably carrying locally-milled flour, some shiny pie-tins, fresh garden vegetables, and to Zelda's dislike at the moment, a pair of freshly plucked and cleaned chickens with a few tiny pin-feathers still stick in the skin here and there.

The girl with the strength that didn't seem to fit her frame plopped the basket down atop the table in that joined kitchen-living room the house had. "Link told me what happened," Malon said. "I was wondering why he was wearing a different hat. I can't believe he took you to the slaughter-shed. Tsk, tsk, tsk. Such a cruel thing to do to an outsider… or a stupid thing."

"Maybe I looked like I could handle it?" Zelda suggested. "I mean… I should…" she balled up the moist rag in her hands. "I mean, if you eat meat, you ought to know how it comes to the table… I guess."

"If you're up to it, you can help me prepare dinner."

"So early?" Zelda asked.

"Oh, there's lots to do. We're having everyone in the valley over. We were… kind of… going to celebrate having a guest. We have big get-togethers every month or so, anyway, and this time it's at our house."

"You were going to do it all yourself?"

"I don't always do dinner," Malon said, "but I'm very good at cooking, and besides, I wanted to come on in to check up on you."

"I'm better, thanks," Zelda said as she got up and wandered into the kitchen-area. She got a strange feeling while looking at Malon. Yes, she did remember that same vivid red shade of hair, only she remembered it attached to a chubby toddler in diapers. Zelda wasn't much older back then… when she played with a tinier girl in the castle garden.

Malon placed the cuccoos into a tray and rubbed their skins over with herbs and oil from a flask. Zelda chopped vegetables for her, which she used for stuffing. Malon noticed the way she looked at the fowl. "Oh, don't worry, Marin," the younger woman said, "They don't feel anything anymore. They probably don't feel a thing once their heads are off. They're completely brainless!"

"Urp!" Zelda said, choking down a gag. "I… I'm sure I'll eat well once they're dressed and cooked. That garlic smells wonderful."

"Slipping garlic slivers beneath the skin gives cuccoo a great flavor. Link loves roast cuccoo. I think he takes it as revenge for all the times they've scratched him."

"Hmm? He gets hurt by them? I thought that only happened when…"

"He likes to tease them, and has ever since he was a kid. He used to play hero using a stick as a sword, chasing the cuccoos around the ranch."

Zelda couldn't help but utter a soft laugh. "That's… that's really kind of cute."

"The cuccoos didn't think so. Nice that Link finally got to be a hero, though… Saving you in the city."

"Yes," Zelda said, keeping her eye on a potato she was turning into cubes, "He was… very brave."

* * *

A sharp, piercing wail shattered the air of almost eighteen years ago outside of the mountain town of Darunia. Those many years later, a man standing before secret graves in the Lost Hills would remember the strength of the cry.

Russell remembered sitting in a chair outside the master bedroom of his brother's mountain-house, watching his wife and daughter out by the horse-pen through a window, worrying over the cries and assorted grunts and noises that his sister-in-law made inside the bedroom. The cry announced that a child with tiny, but strong lungs had just entered the world.

Russell was, of course, on leave with his brother to assist him and his wife in the birth and care of an expected infant. Russell was a father, himself, though of a single daughter who had just learned to walk. He felt still inadequately-new to the situation, but was glad that he and Darla could help Link and Grace in some fashion. They'd been on their own. The family vacation-home in Darunia provided a quiet place, unlike the bustle of Castle Town. Out in the yard, machines hummed. Link had something of an experiment going on with machines he'd built that could draw moisture from the thin air, as well as devices that could recycle wastes.

Link exited the room after a while, holding a bundle wrapped in a soft blanket. His face looked strangely grim.

"Hey, is Gracie okay?" Russ asked.

"Yeah… She's real tired, though… fell asleep. The midwife is watching over her. Kinda… overwhelmed, seein' the little guy for the first time…"

"How is he… or she?"

"I have a son," Link said. A smile tugged at his lips, but he still seemed less than joyful. "Would you like to hold him?"

"Would I?" Russ beamed. He held out his arms to receive his new little nephew. The child squirmed slightly. Russell D'Ordona always wondered why people were so quick to call newborns "cute." To him, they grew into their cute phase later. They were an "ugly-cute," perhaps, like naked little baby songbirds or strange little monkeys or miniature elderly people, all wrinkled and tender.

"Welcome to the world," he said to the boy as the child cracked his eyes open, just a little, only to shut them tightly against a world that was brighter and colder than the warm, dark world of his mother's body. "It's a pretty big world um…kid…? Um…"

"Link," Link answered, "Link Jr."

"Did you and Gracie agree on that name? I thought you were going to name him Ralph…"

"Rafael, yes, but we changed our minds. There aren't many 'Links' in the world, we thought it could use another. It also just seemed right."

The child squirmed enough to free his left hand from the blanket. Its chubby fingers groped blindly. Russ found himself staring at a strange, distinctive mark on the back of it. The mark caught the sunlight that was streaming in through the nearby window and blazed gold for just a second. Russell blinked. He took baby Link's hand between his thumb and forefinger and gingerly manipulated it to get a good look at the strange pattern.

"You see the Triforce," the elder Link said.

"It could just be a temporary mark, a bruise, perhaps," Russell offered.

"I don't think so. He has it in him… my son's been born with a shard of the Triforce in him. This means that he belongs to the goddesses and that Destiny is going to hunt him down like dogs hunting a wild boar. I fear for his life, Russ."

"Nonsense!" Russ said, bouncing the baby boy gently, with practiced arms. "That stuff's all just stories."

"Mom and Dad believed them. You know they named me after the Hero of Winds."

"I thought the Hero of the Rails was supposed to be the most recent in the line."

"I think they were hoping for a hero to bring the tides back," Link Sr. sighed. "But I never chased the Triforce nor had it in me. Now my child is born with it… this does not bode well. The land's been in distress for a long time, but… this means that true Evil is rising. Evil will hunt him, Russell… and he will not know a life except one behind a sword."

"He is your child, nothing more and nothing less. Stop worrying. It's just a birthmark and you will be able to give him a peaceful life." Russ passed Link Jr. into his father's arms. "You need to trust more in yourself than in legends."

* * *

The hills around Ordona Valley were bathed in the gold-toned and orange firelight of sunset when Link met the wolf.

He was mending a gap in a fence on the edge of Lady Gwen's property in an area that was butted right up against the slope of a stony hill when he'd turned around and nearly had a heart-attack. The animal had come upon him silently. It sat upon a chunk of granite, regarding him silently.

s

"What the...?" Link said to himself as he stared at the creature. It was a wolf, alright, and quite a large one – larger than some hunting dogs he'd seen. It had an impressive mane – something that he didn't think wolves were supposed to have; and it had the remains of a metal shackle around one of its paws. Was this creature kept as someone's pet at some point? Was it some kind of experiment – a crossbreed pup of a giant mastiff and a wolf or something? It had blue eyes, which weren't natural on most wild animals that he'd known, save for some birds. Most wild mammals, especially predators had yellow-green eyes or brown eyes. Was it some kind of freak of science – a wolf doped on steroids or potions of some kind?

Link had no weapon. The animal yawned. Link backed up slowly until his hand found a stick that was leaning up against the fence – a branch that had fallen from one of Lady Gwen's trees.

The wolf stood up and padded closer. Link held up the stick, but backed up and around, following the line of the fence. He wasn't going to attack a wild animal unless he was attacked first. He didn't think that screaming and "making himself look big" was going to work on this "freak-beast," either.

The wolf did something that utterly surprised Link, making him wonder if he did, in fact, have a heart attack and was having his death-hallucinations. It spoke.

"You are wielding that improperly," the animal said. "Your wrist is quite stiff. You're never going to carry real steel if you carry a mere stick the way you do."

Link stood stunned. The wolf leapt and topped him to the ground. Reacting defensively, Link kicked and rolled. All he did was send up dust. He got up and looked around for the wolf, bracing himself with his weapon. He blinked, finding himself in a white void. Befuddled, and with his heart racing, the young man looked around. Hits boots sent up clouds of white dust that disappeared into the void. The ghosts of trees appeared all around him. He found that he was walking around in a white mist.

The sky darkened… no… it was a twilight sky. Strange black particles rained down from it, like squares of cut paper - only to vanish like a dry rain before they hit the ground. The white world turned gray. Link was in a gray grove. The leaves on the trees were alight with a ghostly glow, like the last golden gleaming of sunset. The environment was ethereal. He found a young man sitting on a fallen log before a gently glowing spring of water – a spring the likes of which Link had never seen except in illustrations of children's fairy-tale books or fantasy-themed paintings. The young man was dressed in green clothes and heavy boots of an ancient style. He was wearing chainmail beneath a tunic and he had a long hat that Link thought looked ridiculous, but it did match the rest of the way he was dressed. The man had dirty-blond hair, a bit of a darker shade than Link's own, and Hylian ears. He polished an impressive-looking sword with a soft cloth.

"Who are you?" Link cautiously asked, "And where am I?"

The young man looked up. "You aren't in the desert anymore, are you?" he said.

"No, I'm not. Did I just die?"

The young man laughed as he put his sword in its scabbard and stood up. He offered Link a hand. "Let's walk together for a while, shall we?"

"Um… okay, I guess. I'm dying, though, right? I never thought I'd hallucinate being in a grove…"

"This is a forest," the mysterious stranger corrected.

"Those don't exist anymore"

"Hyrule was covered in them in my time.

"In your time?"

"I am… a memory of yours. Sort of. I serve to give you advice from a life gone by."

"So I am dreaming… must have… passed out or somethin'."

"Yes and no. I am your first advisor, so I understand your confusion. It's hard to explain. First of all, you're not dead or dying. After our walk is over, you're going to get up and you're probably going to go home and pretend you never saw me because visions are things that only crazy people get and you're not ready yet to be as eccentric as your friend, Lady Gwen." The oddly-dressed man sighed and stretched his arms behind his back as he walked. "Second, I believe that I am the first to come to you because you and I have much in common. We are centuries apart, but we both revere the ways of nature and know life as ranchers. Some of your memories know the ways of the winds and waves, the ways of machines, the ways of time and space and the ways of deep and wild magic. You and I are most familiar with the ways of beasts and shadows."

"You're right. I am confused," Link answered.

"You are to become the next Hero, Link. I am speaking of our Chain – the line of this world's sacred Heroes."

"Those are just stories. No one's ever been that strong, or good for that matter. And battles with high magic? Give me a break, dream-guy."

The dream-companion laughed. "Oh, I understand where you're coming from," he said. "Magic-use was pretty low in my time, too. Most magic was attached to objects and there were few adepts. Hylians were dwindling… very few had our ears. You're an even rarer creature in your time, aren't you?"

"The girls in town think my ears are… sexy."

The oddly-dressed man laughed aloud. "I suppose we've all been ladies'-men, whether we wanted to be or not."

"Well, I'm not a man's-man, if that's what you think," Link replied. "Not that I'm insulting your looks, and who is this 'we'?"

"The Heroes," the man replied. "I know you don't believe it now, but it will come to you in time – you are our latest reincarnation. Your spirit is the ancient Hero's Spirit. In other words, you were me once, long ago. You are your own, now. You've lived many lives… most of them noble. If you need a name to call me by, you may address me as the Wolf, or as the Hero of Twilight."

The Hero of Twlight jogged ahead until he was walking in front of Link, backwards, facing him, with his hands behind his head. He smiled slyly. "And, yes, we are good, but not all of us have been good entirely. Our Spirit does have a devious streak, a little bit of rebelliousness that comes out at just the right time. Some of us are a little more innocent than others. As I've said, I am of the shadows. I didn't always do things the nice way. There is a reason why when the energies of the Twilight Realm hit me, I became a large and dangerous predator rather than, say, a little bunny-rabbit."

"I remember the story now… an old tale. It became popular again after the Rift opened in the west, in the mountains bordering Holodrum. There are Twili emissaries in Castle Town, but I've never seen one."

"Is that not magic?"

"It's explainable by science. It's a parallel universe. The place is like another country, just writ large."

"Is that so? Oh, what I would have given to see it," the Hero of Twilight sighed, once again walking next to Link. "My only connection to that world was lost in my time. I'd been there, you know, and I cared for someone from that country deeply. To think she would have guarded gateways all this time only for nature to foil her… Perhaps light and darkness could have mixed, after all."

Ignoring the sadness in his companion's voice, Link went on, "There's not much mixing, just a few emissaries that have to stay indoors during the day and have to use powerful technologies to keep from being burned if they do go outside. I hear they even have to use 'fields' to keep themselves from being burned by our moon. From the rumors I hear in Nabooru, people don't much like the aliens. It's said that they're really stuck up and think of us as being like cattle."

"Oh, I hope there won't be another war," the Hero of Twilight said. "I might just have to take over your spirit and your body in that case because I'd be the only one who'd know what he's doing!"

"I doubt it. It's their technology that they lord over us and it's too weird for us to really care about it. Nothing they do is practical."

"Strange… my dear partner was a very practical person. Anyway, I am here to teach you a few basics about what Destiny will demand of you."

The two had come to a beautiful clearing. There were ancient statues and brickwork, broken and crumbled in places in among the thin, whispery trees. The Hero of Twilight passed his sheathed sword into Link's hands. "Gird that on and take up thy sword," the man instructed. He, meanwhile, went to a pedestal that was in the center of the grove and loosened a strangely-glowing sword that was struck there. Before Link could even buckle the belt of the sword–scabbard over himself, the Hero of Twilight was upon him.

The ancient Hero swept for Link's legs, causing him to trip hard on the courtyard's moss-covered stones. Apparently, he could still feel pain in this dream, or at least his hips could. He looked up to see the tip of a very sharp weapon pointed at his nose.

"You're dead," the Hero of Twilight said, taking the sword back and offering a hand to help him up. "You'll never live the noble life that Hyrule needs of you if you're going to go down that easy."

"I've never done swordplay before," Link confessed. "What's the point of it when I could use a gun? I guess they didn't have those back in your day, if you are the Hero from the old Twilight Legend, but they're powerful. They work at a distance, like… like arrows, but they're many times more powerful. That's why all the lawmen use them in my day, as well as all the criminals. No one uses swords anymore."

"Swords don't run out of ammo," the Hero of Twilight quipped. "Anyway, if you are one of us, of the Hero's Line, you will need to learn how to use a sword. I don't care what kind of gadgets are at work in your day, it's only been the Master Sword that's been able to put down the very essence of Evil. Only light dispels darkness, even if that light is twilight. If you wish to water your desert, you will need the sacred sword's power. Come on again, come at me. Take up thy sword. Hold it with a fluid wrist. Follow my example and I'll show you how to sweep and dodge."

Link complied. After a while, he found that he was enjoying this little dream. Too bad what one did while asleep or passed out didn't translate to a physical workout. He could have used this, even if it made him sore later. He learned a forward thrust-stab, sideways slices, a jumping-strike and even a circular attack meant to cut down enemies that surrounded him on all sides.

The Hero of Twilight did not look overly impressed. "Good enough," he said. "It's a good start. You'll know now what to do once you finally have a sword in your hands and you'll learn the finer points through experience… I hope."

"Thanks… I guess."

"You'll be visited by others in time," the ancient Hero explained. "They'll first appear as I have… in the forms of animals symbolic of their essence, because you and the Princess of Destiny are the key to nature reclaiming what has been lost."

"Princess of Destiny?"

"You should ask her if she's had any visions, too. You'll know her in time. Also, if you see Midna… tell her…for me… Uh… You'll know what to say."

Before Link could ask the Hero of Twilight about the last thing he'd said, the world washed itself away in gray and he awakened. The sun was gone, leaving an outline of fire over the mountains. In the gloom, Link could see that Lady Gwen's fence was now fully-repaired. Save for a small tuft of hair on the lower-wire of the fence, there was no sign that the wolf he'd seen had even been there. Link looked for tracks in the dirt and found none. He wandered back home, wondering just what had happened.

* * *

Russell was waiting for Link on the porch when he saw the boy come up from Gwen's place. He'd arrived home about an hour ago, had taken care of his horse and had presented Malon with some wild chilies he'd picked out in the desert on his way back from his trip. She'd chopped them up and put them in a little bowl as an option for anyone who wanted to add smoke coming out of their ears to their dining experience, namely, Russ, Link and Mr. Fado. Everyone else who lived in the Valley was gathered in the house. Savory smells wafted through from inside.

Russ decided that it was time that Link learned the truth about his parents – where they were buried and how they'd died. It was time that he'd learned the meaning of his birthmark. Tonight, he'd take him aside and give him the whole story. Tomorrow, he'd take the boy to the Lost Hills. For now, however, they would enjoy dinner, the company of their friends, and the company of their new guest, "Marin."

Link came inside and washed up, telling no one of his "vision." Although it had felt very real to him, he convinced himself that he'd passed out. Even at sunset, the heat was blazing and he probably hadn't been drinking enough water. It was supposed to be the beginning of Fall, but there really wasn't much difference between the seasons in Hyrule anymore. Ordona Valley would be lucky if the Winter rains came. They'd been slightly paltry last year. He sat down next to Zelda.

"Marin!" he gasped, "What happened to you?"

Zelda held up her left hand. The knuckles were wrapped in a tight, white bandage. "I'm not as used to cooking as I'd like to be," she answered.

"She was helping me out," Malon said, setting down a platter with roasted cuccoos smelling richly of garlic and rosemary. "She was helping me all afternoon kneading dough and chopping vegetables. I told her to watch the knife, but…"

"I got really into it!" Zelda said, excitedly, "Chop, chop, chop, mincing fine… and I kind… scraped myself with the edge of the knife. I'm alright, really. It's just a little scrape."

Link's stomach growled. He reached for a buttered roll when Malon wrapped his hand with the flat side of a wooden spoon. "We say grace first, Link."

Everyone turned to Lady Gwen, the usual blessing-giver for these gatherings. She invoked Farore and gave thanks for the sacrifice of lives on the part of the animals who were now savory meat and gravy. She invoked Din to thank for the blessings of the earth, in which grew the vegetables and fruit, and she invoked her personal patron goddess, Nayru in thanks for all of the wise hearts that were gathered at the table. Lastly, she breathed a small prayer for the "mortal spirit of Hylia, wherever she is in the world."

Zelda dropped the fork she was holding onto her plate. It created a loud ring. "It… it slipped," she said, not sure why she had experienced a sudden shiver.

Cuccoo was sliced nice and thin, mashed potatoes were spooned, as were vegetables with butter. Rolls were paired with creamy herbed cheese and pies were sliced. Everyone talked and laughed, and for "Marin's" sake, her troubles in the slaughter-shed were not brought up. For her part, she'd never tasted more flavorful chicken. The roasted cuccoo was both fresh and had been fed well, as well as been allowed to run around its enclosure. The exercise, sunshine and fresh air was reflected in its flesh. It was almost like the taste of a wild thing, without a gamey aftertaste.

Everyone who was not stuffed was on dessert when strange murmurs sounded from outside.

"Have travelers come to our door?" Russell asked. "It's so late…"

Zelda suddenly felt a sense of panic. Before anyone went to the door, all of the windows of the main room iced over.


End file.
